Polymath, visionary and indefatigable change agent. Founder of Polymathica, a global community of intellectual sophistication, The Polymathic Institute, which promotes polymathic research, education, careers and lifestyles, The Polymath, a weekly PDF magazine of erudite analysis and commentary. Pages describe my original work.

Saturday, January 17, 2015

The Polymath Entertainment Supplement

The Polymathic Institute uses Mailchimp.com to manage its e-mail lists. The primary use will be for the weekly PDF magazine of erudite analysis and commentary, The Polymath. I believe that The Polymath's calculated circulation of six million will be closely approached in the three to five year time frame. It will reach this circulation because one of its most important editorial policies is to publish articles on topics where the mediocracy gets it wrong. Consequently, The Polymath will surprise and engage its readers. An example can be found in the Omega Hypothesis page under 'Divine Intervention Through Synchronicity.'

Mailchimp.com provides 12 e-mails per name per month in its standard account. The Polymath will take four or five of those leaving seven or eight e-mails per subscriber per month. Some of that will be used for a peer reviewed, Journal of the Polymathic Institute. We also will likely send personal invitations to Fellowship and a limited number of special communications. However, such supplemental e-mails will still leave a whole lot for other uses.

One idea, and I am truly excited about it, is The Polymath Entertainment Supplement. Amazon and others sell books, music, videos and games on their site, generally taking 30% from the content provider, paying 4%-6% to the affiliate, and retaining 24%-26% for processing the payment and sending the content to the customer. This is a big number that leaves plenty of room for improvement.

On Amazon content that would appeal to Polymathicans is not uncommon, but typically languishes, often selling 100 units or less per year. On YouTube the same is true about music and video. Creating a video on YouTube is relatively easy, but micro-niches rarely find even 1% of their market.

We can improve upon that, immensely. By doing so we will do two very exciting things. First, we will enable the '1,000 True Fans' concept. Second, we will create a community of well compensated Reviewers. We will take 25% from content producers, but we will aggressively promote their content. Consequently, the perceived value of Polymathica for our content producers is much greater than Amazon.

Reviewers will retain 10% which is substantially better than Amazon. However, for the 4%-6% that Amazon pays its affiliates, it still expects the affiliate to deliver the traffic. The Polymath Entertainment Supplement is part of the Polymathica Enterprise Network and as such, the traffic is provided as part of its 'cut'. Reviewers are paid for finding and presenting content of special interest to Polymathicans.

Polymathicans are voracious readers and their tastes generally don't conform to mainstream preferences. Consequently, there may be a market for as many as 25 million book sales per year through the Entertainment Supplement when circulation exceeds 4 million. The $240 million in sales will go $180 million to the authors, $24 to reviewers and $36 million to The Polymathic Institute.

As a rough estimate, we may have 30 books reviewed per month and 15 reviewers. The 360 authors will sell an average of 70,000 copies for royalties of over $500,000 per year. Reviewers will review 24 books per year with sales of 1,680,000 copies and commissions of $1,671,600. At first, the Reviewers will scour the low volume e-books on Amazon.com to find appropriate content. However, over time, the authors will approach them.

The 1,000 True Fans concept is particularly amenable to the music industry. There are literally tens of thousands of musicians who are good, but not commercially viable within any of the commercial genre. Some may have a CD to sell or a DVD concert. Assuming that our reviewers review two of these ($12-$15 ea) each month and the average sells 50,000 copies @ $12 ea the reviewer will earn $1,440,000. There should be sufficient activity to support 8-10 music reviewers. Because of the many delivery modes of music it is more difficult to characterize musicians, but it should be able to support at least 200 musicians @ $350,000 per year.

There will be plenty of activity in the future for video and games but at present there are no viable business models. The books and music reviews can be undertaken immediately, return six figure income soon after the completion of The Polymath crowd funding and seven figures within three years.

This is an opportunity worth fighting for, if it interests you. You will search for obscure but great books and music and tell millions of people about it. Even when you are earning seven figures it will be part time which will allow you to create your finely crafted life.

Everyone who contacts me wants to write articles for The Polymath. I do not want to discourage them, but, frankly, very few will be successful. To succeed, one must possess a very high level of intellectual sophistication, a penchant for thinking outside of the mainstream box and, of course, you must be a very high quality writer.

On the other hand becoming a successful Reviewer is a more realistic objective. You need to have the persistence to find the high quality Creative and enlist them in the process. You need to be a good, but not necessarily great, writer. And, as you can see, the income is potentially even better than that of the Creatives you will manage.

We will probably send out two supplements so we have about four mailings left. So, stay tuned for more ideas. However, be sure to subscribe to the Polymath so you can be sure not to miss anything important.

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Michael W. Ferguson

Polymath, visionary and change agent

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Fundable.com for many this will be the best crowdfunding platform for equity offerings. Their charge is $179 per month. Of course, the payment processing fee of 3.2% to 3.7% is extra. Still, a three month, $500,000 offering will only have a total cost of around $18,000 to $20,000 far below the 9% to 10% of most platforms. Of course, like all equity funding sites, you will need to bring most of the investors yourself. That is where P.E.N. comes in.

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Career Advice

You can't earn a living telling people how things are or how they will be. You earn a living by feeding their confirmation bias. That is not a career to which one should aspire.

On Fools

I really have attempted to abide by the apostolic admonition to suffer fools gladly. However, in the end, there were just too many of them.

On Being Human

I was asked, 'In what way does human intellect differ from other animals in kind and not just in degree?' I answered, 'Only humans can ask that question.'

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Those who say, 'That's just my opinion' rarely mean it. Those who say, 'That's just your opinion' almost always do.

IQ in Perspective

A guy once quoted to me, 'When a wise man points at a star the fool looks at his finger.'
I replied, 'True. But so does my dog and I love her dearly.
Let's not overly weigh intelligence in our assessments of worth.'

The First Principle of Information Age Political Philosophy

No person should be required to live under a body of laws, programs and policies that they consider to be fundamentally unjust.

How Markets Really Work

Perception is reality...until reality steps in and says, 'OK, enough!!!'

On the Mainstream News

Pitting a Left Wing lunatic against a Right Wing lunatic gets you a whole lot of pyrotechnics but absolutely no useful insights. You can't average them and find yourself in a defensible middle.

Knowing the Future

There has been no time in the last 200 years when the world thirty years hence was generally believable. Therefore, if someone tells you what the world will be like in thirty years and it seems reasonable, history says that they are wrong.

Make a Difference

I am interested in what you have done, what you are doing and what you will do. I am supremely indifferent to what you could do, but won't. Consequently, I don't care very much about your IQ.